Bullying A Dragon
by Bae Gracey
Summary: A little mutant girl runs away from the police, and wonders what she did to deserve this.


With as fast a run that her short legs could manage, the small and young mutant child raced through the streets as the human police officers chased after her. It wasn't her fault, why couldn't they see? She had been born this way, and that was only her genetics to blame! Not her! She was not the reason she was a mutant! If they wanted to hurt anyone, it would have to be the man above, the man in charge of everything, the man that had made her this way... But how could the humans fight their own God? Still, bullying a dragon like mutants wasn't necessarily a smart idea, either...

A trip, and suddenly the girl face planted against the mud. The thing about where she had ended up was, while this part of the city had its sidewalks and pavement, she had been running across the grass of the one of many parks in order to escape the police officers. With her face planted against the ground, she straightened, her red hair now had dirt and mud all over it, and on her face. Sitting up, she teared up at the sudden occurrence before getting up and starting to run again. She couldn't let them get her!

They were gaining up to her, and for a moment she questioned, '_Why can't my mutant power be speed?_' but instead of cursing that for longer than she had to, she looked up at the sky, and wished she could fly. Though, maybe she could. With her ability to control the air around her, maybe she could lift herself and fly to get away from the oncoming police officers.

As she tried her best to fly up into the air as fast as she could, little ten year old Ashley Hughes wondered who she made angry enough to be placed into this situation. She was a mutant, yes, but her parents, as she far as she was aware, had loved her very much. Her mother always bought her the best toys, and her father always read her bedtime stories... She didn't even know how those meanie police officers knew she was a mutant to begin with. It had been a family secret. Her parents had said to not tell anyone before they managed to contact Professor Charles Xavier to get her into that school that overlooked New York from the north end. They said that what she had was a gift and she should be proud of it. Though... Ashley wasn't too sure those people chasing her agreed with her parents. Sure, they were accepting of what she could do, but not everyone seemed to like it.

Well, the other mutants that lived in town here liked it. They said that she should keep practicing with it and experiment. Get to know it so it was her friend. Her parents, wanting their daughter to really get to understand what she could do, had called a mutant hotline and contacted local mutants to help her until they managed to get a hold of Professor Xavier. And now, here she was, _flying _through the sky like she was a comic book character rather than a living, breathing human being, escaping the police officers like she was an X-Man! It was a most exhilarating feeling and Ashley was proud of herself for accomplishing this, for getting this far with her power. It was like she was a bird, now she was flying away from it all like a pro.

She wobbled a little. Okay, so maybe not. But it was still thrilling! Just wait until Richie and Georgie hear about this -

**_BOOM. _**A sound that Ashley had only ever heard on television before sounded through the air. Her eyes widened at it, and for a moment, she thought about all those shows she would watch with her mom on the couch in the living room while her dad would make up some sort of snack. And then, it was like all she could think about was her short little mutant life.

_Her third birthday. She had gotten a doll from her grandmother that she had left in her bedroom all the time. _

What was happening? Why was this happening? What had she ever done to ever deserve this?

_Her first day of kindergarten, where she had met Ronnie Masters and had decided she didn't like him one bit. He was always brash and mean to her, and still was today. She wondered vaguely if he had passed that spelling test that was last month... he had never been good at spelling..._

Why did mutants have to be so hated? Why did the humans always have to resort to violence? Why couldn't they just all get along and realize that hurting people never got anyone everywhere? These people had all passed kindergarten, right? It was basic stuff. Even she understood it. All those teachers always said to "Use your words!" and then said to explain, and say what was the matter rather than picking up that Tonka truck and smacking the other kid with it across the face and expect them to understand.

_First grade, second grade, third grade... Julie Jones, her best friend forever... Julie never knew Ashley was a mutant._

Ashley Hughes was falling. She had realized this about three seconds ago. She couldn't control her power anymore, it was like she never had it. She was plummeting down to the ground and could see the crowd of people gathering at her landing zone. Her shirt was turning red. Had she been hit? She must have been. It was a gun she had heard, right? What was happening, why couldn't she feel the pain...?

_Two weeks ago. Richie, Justin and Georgie were showing her all these pamphlets of Xavier's school, saying that her parents were working on getting her in. Apparently after they called the pamphlets had shown up in the mail. Georgie Connor. Justin Kale. Richie Moons. Those three adults her parents had called, who had declared themselves her guardian angels..._

Ashley didn't remember what day it was. She figured it must be a Tuesday. She'd always liked Tuesdays. Those were the days her school would do the music and art classes. She liked those.

_... Her guardian angels..._

Ashley didn't remember what she had been doing before she had been chased away.

_... They..._

Suddenly she was on the ground. She was being picked up carefully by one of the men that had surrounded her. She was greeted with the sight of some amazingly stunning eyes. Ashley knew she would never forget those eyes - those stunning, wonderful eyes that made her think most people winced away from. The irises were red... with the usually white part of the eye being black. She never did find out what that part of the eye was called. She was sure there was a word for it. The man with the unique eyes was looking at her with a concerned look. Why?

_... have..._

Everyone around her was saying something. They were all saying something to _her_. The main problem was... Ashley didn't know what they were saying. Instead, she was looking up at the sky. It was a beautiful blue. For some reason, it had been very stormy lately and the sky was grey most of the time. But, today... it was blue.

_... failed._

Ashley watched as the sky became more and more white, and the faces around her started to fade away. The sounds she couldn't hear, she was certain they weren't important. She was just falling asleep for a little while. They could all play tomorrow...

* * *

Remy LeBeau watched as the shine in the girl's eyes faded away to a dull, glassy look. The red that was pouring out onto her shirt from the bullet wound turned the blue cotton into an ugly mix of red, blue and purple. The shirt was surely ruined, and the parents of the child probably wouldn't want to keep it. It was wet, sticky, and unbecoming of the child that had once lived, laid in his arms. With a sigh, and trying his best to hold back on any negative emotions, he looked up at the crowd of people that had gathered around him. Most of them were humans, looking at him with slight disdain, yet small horror at the dead child in his arms. Was this what they wanted? A child's death in the wake of the human-mutant wars? Most likely not.

A woman with blonde hair pushed through the crowd and, horrified, knelt down beside him, taking hold of the child's small hands. Remy realized that the woman most likely knew her. She was choking on her sobs, a wave of emotions being cast out from her to the others around her. The downside of being an empath.

"_Elle est mort_," he announced to the woman. It wasn't an easy thing for him to say, even in French. "... She's dead."

The woman sobbed uncontrollably, the onrush of emotions coming from her only getting worse as she continued. Remy looked away, feeling the urge of grabbing a playing card or _something_ and charging it, throwing it at the most likely person to have done this to a child. He didn't even care if the one he hit was the one that had dealt the blow to her. He just wanted to blow something up that could have been at fault. Killing a child was simply wrong.

"... She was only ten," the woman voiced, her voice catching on itself and her sobs making her almost unintelligible. "_She was only ten._"

... It wasn't fair.

With another sigh, Remy reached a hand down toward the little girl's face, and carefully closed her eyes. If he hadn't known any better, and if her shirt wasn't completely bloodstained with her blood getting onto his trenchcoat, he'd have thought that the little redhead in her arms was simply just sleeping. It was a shame. He couldn't even pretend. He did know better. "_Adieu, petit enfant_," he voiced softly.

A child was killed today.


End file.
